The truth is now out. Arun Jaitley's pretend achievements as Finance Minister have amounted to no more than squeezing the lemon till the pips squeak. They are squeaking so loudly that his government has been compelled to reverse policy and lower by a tithe the zooming prices of petroleum products.

Consistency has never been a virtue in the RSS. From VD Savarkar to Dr Hedgewar to 'Guru-ji' Golwalkar to Balasaheb Deoras to Mohan Bhagwat, opportunism has marked the politics of the RSS even though they have ever cleaved to a 'Hindu Rashtra' as their ideological goal.

Amit Shah's desperate attempt to find a foothold in the state by hook or by crook is simply not taking off because even the various factions of the AIADMK find the BJP an embarrassment; Dinkaran is behind none in denouncing the Modi government; Kamal Haasan has firmly ruled out having any truck with Modi-Shah; and, for the DMK-Congress, of course, ...

The government may have its explanations. The Raksha Mantri seemed about a year ago more than ready to spill the information. Then she clamped down - or was made to clamp down. Just as the lies they told about Bofors were eventually exposed, the truth about Rafale will also be exposed.

Sidhu did no more than "do in Rome what the Romans do". Giving a hug to Bajwa would have received only passing notice if the BJP had not, as they always do, sought to communalize the issue and create salience between "Pakistani" and "Muslim" to push forward their divisive agenda.

He was, above all, a truly outstanding parliamentarian, so outstanding that soon after he was first elected to the Lok Sabha in 1957, Pandit-ji was telling his confidantes within months that young Atal Bihari seemed to have in him the makings of a future Prime Minister. Two incidents when Atal-ji was still in his 30s illustrate this assessment.

It was not Nehru's aching desire to be PM but principally Jinnah himself, Mountbatten and his staff, the Congress Working Committee and eventually a despairing Gandhi-ji who gave up on this will o' the wisp of keeping India united by making Jinnah PM.

While Amit Shah alluded in his intervention in parliament to Rajiv Gandhi having announced the accord during his Independence Day address to the nation next day from the ramparts of the Red Fort, he does not seem to have read the speech because Rajiv Gandhi says the accord was signed "yesterday" (14 August), then quickly corrects himself to say it ...

For us in India, the near-universal rejection of Pakistan's religion-based parties is perhaps the most significant outcome of this election - for it demonstrates (once again) that far from being partisans of fanatical Islamic terrorists, Pakistanis, by and large, reject religious extremism and terror politics.

Hence his denigration of a gesture aimed at indicating that in a democracy we have opponents not enemies, that we do not have to harbour hatred in our hearts against those with whom we do not agree. Modi-Shah do not understand that.

As a self-confessed "secular fundamentalist", I believe this is the time and juncture for me to stand up and say that Shashi Tharoor is spot on: the Bharat which the Hindutva forces are pledged to realize would be a mirror image of Muslim Pakistan, thus making of secular India a 'Hindu Pakistan'.

For the third time in succession, Pakistan goes to the polls on July 25 to elect both the new parliament (called in Pakistan the National Assembly) and the four provincial assemblies of Punjab, Sind, Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP, known to Indian readers more by its previous name, North-West Frontier Province - NWFP).

Mesmerized by Modi's strong man image, Mehbooba allowed herself to be diddled by his false promises and her vain hopes. Now, she has been cast aside by the same Modi on whom she pinned her excessive expectations.